4A = THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
OPINION
THURSDAY,FEB.28,2002
TALKTOUS
Leita Walker
editor
964-4854 or wehkans.com
Jay Krall
Kyle Ramsey
managing editors
864-4854 or krall@kanasan.com and
kramsey@kanasan.com
Clay McCusition
readers' representative
864-4810 or incruciol@ansan.com
Kursten Phelps
Brooke Hesler
opinion editor
864-4810 or kphleps@kansan.com and
bheloser@kansan.com
Amber Agee business manager 864-4014 or addreder@kanasan.com
Kate Mariani
retail sales manager
864-442 or
retailassistant@ansan.com
Malcolm Gibson
general manager and news
adviser
864-7657 or mbsonso@kansan.com
Matt Fisher
sales and marketing adviser
864-7666 or mfisher@kansan.com
KNIGHT RIDDER TRIBUNE
'Kansan'reportcard
- Dean of students. Richard Johnson sits in the Kansas Union once a week so that students cant talk to him about anything. Accessible administrators are always a plus.
- Blood drive. Although turnout was down from last semester, the people who donated their time and blood at the campus blood drive should be commended.
Pass:
Kansas women's basketball team. Even though they've had a rough season, these women still play their hearts out.
Fail:
■ Excessive fire alarms. In case you didn't know, pulling the fire alarm in a residence hall is not cool. Just ask the 800 cold, angry McCollum Hall residents who were stranded outside for two hours in the middle of the night last week.
Unpredictable Kansas weather. A 40-plus degree drop in less than a day? Don't put away those sweaters, yet. Winter's back with a vengeance.
Vanilla Ice. His macho acts of lifting up women's shirts at his concert on Friday is not appreciated. He also gets a fail just for being Vanilla Ice.
PERSPECTIVE
Ethnic studies illuminate diversity present a balanced viewpoint
For three hours every week, I can pretend the University of Kansas is actually diverse.
My African American Humor and Comedy class features the only black professor. I appreciate ethnic studies courses because I learn history never mentioned in my earlier education.
Myths — such as pioneers, soldiers and cowboys all being white — contaminate our collective American spirit. Just because minorities were rarely mentioned in history classes doesn't mean that they didn't factor into our past.
I remember having to tell my white fifth-grade teacher that "colored" was no longer an acceptable term for African Americans. How could I expect a balanced portrayal of history from a woman who was 50 years behind on race relations?
I readed the one day African Americans were mentioned — in the watered-down explanation of slavery. I could feel every white child's eyes on the back of my neck. The only time they saw someone who looked like me in the book was a picture of a slave in shackles.
Images are powerful. If you don't think so, imagine a world in which the majority of images reflect a race other than your own.
As people argue the need of ethnic studies and Black History Month, they miss the real purpose. The multicultural view of history is not a passing fad or an exercise in political correctness. It's the realization that white people aren't the only ones who shaped this country.
Americans like to put black-history makers in little boxes for mass consumption. We keep Martin Luther King Jr. trapped in a perpetual dream and Malcolm X in an everlasting militant stance. We relearn the same facts every year and call it progress.
COMMENTARY
Alexzia Plummer opinion@kansan.com
In a perfect world, there would be no need for special classes or months. We would learn the whole history of this country and know all races' contributions. But this world isn't perfect, and
we can't wish away problems of race relations by ignoring them. Colorblindness doesn't mean swallowing a whitewashed view of history.
The ethnic history classes that I've taken at the University have helped balance the education I got before coming to college. As I sit in my African American comedy class, I enjoy hearing diverse viewpoints I don't hear elsewhere on campus.
I encourage anyone to take an ethnic studies course and experience a different perspective on history. None of these classes will make you an expert, nor are they a badge of new enlightenment. They simply bring the campus closer to intelligent and productive discussions about race relations.
Plummer is a Bellevue, Neb., sophomore in journalism.
PERSPECTIVE
Protesters should stop their whining
When I opened The University Daily Kansan on Monday, I was greeted by two ghastly sights. One was Vanilla Ice, and the other was people protesting Starbucks, 647 Massachusetts St.
This is the second time people have protested the selling out of downtown this school year. The first was the rally last fall, in which people brought couches and blocked the 600 block of Massachusetts Street to protest, among other things, more corporate storefronts on the street.
It really chaps my big Filipino ass that I can't walk into a Starbucks and buy a caramel macchiato without some environmentalist shoving a sign in front of my face about free-trade coffee beans. You don't see me protesting in front of the Community Mercantile about how tofu tastes like feet and how harmless bean sprouts were killed so a vegetarian could enjoy a soy burger.
It boggles my mind that people actually protested in front of a Starbucks and that there was an Organic Consumers Association's Starbucks Week of Action. Don't these people have more productive things to do, such as fire-bombing oil rigs or spray painting someone's fur coat?
If I want to buy $100 pre-ripped jeans
COMMENTARY
Eric Borja opinion@kansan.com
You know what? That's not how it works. Corporate businesses have worked together with local businesses in Lawrence very well and they compliment each other. Corporate businesses bring bodies downtown, and that makes everybody happy. You think people from Eudora or Tonganoxie come into Lawrence to shop at Sugarart Traders, 918 Massachusetts St. They don't.
at Abercrombie & Fitch, 647 Massachusetts St. I, will to think about the character of Lawrence and how it's such a unique town. And if I buy those lovely jeans, I will be putting some poor independent shop owner on the street.
People shop at Eddie Bauer Inc, The Gap, both 643 Massachusetts St., Urban Outfitters, 1031 Massachusetts St., and the like. If they didn't, the stores wouldn't be in business.
This same fear happened when Borders Books Music & Cafe, 700 New Hampshire St., came into town. Everyone freaked out because they thought Borders would make all the local book shops go under. But several local bookstores are still in business.
I find it ironic that while the Protesters want more compensation for the coffee growers of the world, the clothes that they wear are made by citizens of Third World countries who get paid less than coffee growers.
This brings me back to those tree- huggers — I mean, protesters. The Kansan article stated that the students were protesting Starbucks for not using more fair-trade coffee in its products, and that Starbucks used hormone-enhanced milk. Why not protest Starbucks for selling caffeinated products for keeping students up past their bedtimes?
Instead of bothering people who want a cup of coffee, protesters should eat breakfast, lunch and dinner at the independently owned coffee shops.I am sure the sweet moral victory against a corporate giant like Starbucks is better than any tofu fajita money can buy.
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Borja is a Springfield, Mo., junior in journalism.
Here's an idea, the next time you and your staff decide to print an article pertaining to exercise and nutrition, find a laboratory that specifically deals with how exercise and nutrition affect the human body, and ask the individuals who possess the knowledge about those subjects all the questions you desire.
If you're going to write articles regarding exercise and nutrition, can you at least use individuals as references that have a clue as to what message they're sending to the public? Do you think a "vitamin assistant" can tell you how carbohydrates, proteins and fats affect your metabolism?
Dear editor:
I'm a doctoral student in exercise physiology. Your article ("Some energy bars fall short," Jan. 28) on energy bars was just what we needed: something else regarding exercise and nutrition that's misleading and incorrect.
As someone who has devoted my life to studying the effects of exercise on the human body and how we as a population can become healthy again, I'm disgusted at the majority of the articles in your paper that deal with exercise and health issues. I hope in the future your staff will spend more time performing in-depth research of the issues in exercise and nutrition before you expose your audience to irrelevant information.
Mike Carper Kansas City, Mo., graduate student
864-0500 free for
Free for All callers have 20 seconds to speak about
any topic they wish. Kansan editors reserve the right to omit comments. Slanderous and obscene statements will not be printed. Phone numbers of all incoming calls are recorded.
For more comments, go to www.kansan.com.
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Why is it when guys masturbate the cops get called, but when girls masturbate buddies get called?
Dude, I just wanted you to know that I put a curse on that football stool. Every time you sit on it you're going to have a terrible run around your ass.
I'm listening to V-Ice on KJHK. Apparently he likes to have sex all night, 'cause he said about 3,000 times in his new song.
Ghani had better food than Oliver Hall.
This is the cute guy in the history class.
Well, I tell you what, if you give me a big
winning smile I'll say hello to you.
I'm a single lady calling from the Crossing, and I just wanted to let all the boys at the KU campus know that Dr. Martens went out of style in about 1994. Please put it in the paper, and let them know.
so I'm watching this commercial that says when I buy my drugs I'm supporting terrorism. Why doesn't the government legalize drugs, so when I buy my drugs I'm supporting them and not terrorism?
I was making love to this girl last night, and in the middle of it told her she made me want to be a kindergarten teacher. I didn't talk to her after that.
Yeah, this was my friend's pick-up line,
and he didn't even say it right. It sucks.
Listen here's what I have to say, the Triangle house is not a fraternity. It's not a Greek letter. It's a shape, and it's not a real frat. Triangle, you suck.
All I have to say is, this is my words of wisdom: all girls need to break up with their boysfriend, everyone needs to drink more beer and Free for All rocks. What's up with that?
Here we go. Yes, that was my friend that yelled at the guy in the yellow sweater.
Sorry we thought you were a girl, but my friend says she doesn't care if your舅 sent you the sweater. It's still ugly, and you probably shouldn't have been wearing it.
Free for All, what is with that? I know you have caller ID, and everyone here decided that you should have all our quotes from this number in the paper on Monday. So you should put all the quotes from this number in the paper on Monday. Random, random, random. I'm in a sorority, and I said random. I'm not in a sorority, but I'll say random too.
Yeah, my friend just poured her beer in the pitcher, and I'm kind of pissed off. Wouldn't that make you upset too?
Hi, this on the dude that called the other day on sorochity cocks saying random all the time, I think the response would be, "As if."
Hey, how many athletes or RAs would it take to screw in a light bulb? None, University housing would do it for them.
I have a calendar, and it has a ferret on it,
and it's so cute, and the ferret's wearing a little hat. My roommate hates it, but I love it, and my fish loves it too.
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For everyone in the intramural basketball tournament, beware. Delta Chi team three is on a roll.
Hey Drew Gooden, here's the deal: If you win the national championship I'll personally pack your bags for you for the NBA; but if we don't, you come back for your senior season. That's the deal.
Drew, you know what, forget what everyone is saying. You should go pro. Paul Pierce is the only Jayhawk under Roy Williams to go after his junior year. Hey why not?
Yeah, so I'm just sitting in the Fieldhouse thinking about all the great past basketball players we had from the University of Kansas, and does anyone remember John Crider, the former KU bench warmer, I mean basketball player. Anyone? Yeah, that's what I thought.
Me and my friends are jaywalking right now, so we are the jaywalking Jay-hawks.
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I would just like to say that my intramural team ran a frat team by 70 points.
A lot of talk has been made about frats ruling the University of Kansas. They may rule drinking; but as far as sports and athletics goes, they need to get out of intramurals.